Note: This is a seattlepi.com reader blog. It is not written or edited by the P-I. The authors are solely responsible for content. E-mail us at newmedia@seattlepi.com if you consider a post inappropriate.

“Books are very patient objects. We buy them, and then they wait for us to read them. Days, months, even years. That’s OK for books, but not for new authors. If people don’t read their first books. They’ll never make it to a second.” …

Physical books are not the only ones that are in danger these days. New Latin American authors are threatened as well. In the last 20 years the book sales from new Latin-American writers have decreased by a total of 37%. These new authors, unlike the established and famous ones, suffer every second that their books are left on a shelf. They not only need to be sold, but also need to be read. Word of mouth is crucial to building a writer’s career, so they can make it to a second book.

“The Book That Can’t Wait” is an anthology of recent Latin American writing that was published by Eterna Cadencia, an independent publisher and bookstore in Honduras. Each book comes with an expiration date and once removed from the packaging has a shelf-life of two months before the specially designed ink begins to disappear. …

The buzz was big enough that the whole first edition was spoken for on publication day.

Now what? The publisher plans to release other neglected or under-read work in a similar format.

Gimmick or marketing genius?

Granted, the publisher says that they would have had to spend a million pesos to generate the same amount of attention for their authors using traditional advertising channels but what if the campaign promoted well-made books that are guaranteed to last hundreds of years if cared for?

I would prefer to spend a lifetime with a book I enjoyed then watch it disappear after a couple of months.

“What if you thought seriously about the library as a laboratory, as a place where people do things, where they make things?”says Jeffrey Schnapp.

The class is called “The Library Test Kitchen.” It is taught by Schnapp and offered through the Graduate School of Design (GSD) at Harvard University.

During the class “ideas flew like cream pies at a food fight” and before the semester was out some of the ideas were developed into student projects. Pictured above is the Neo-Carrel, a “study chair with a raised platform in front that doubles as a laptop
stand and a comfortable place to rest one’s head for a nap.”

Then there is Biblio, “a “library friend” that scans books, tracks and shares research,
and even makes bibliographic recommendations for further study'”

and finally, the Wi-Fi Cold Spot “a radically designed room for reflection or refuge from an increasingly connected world”

“Because we’re not librarians, but instead a community of artists,
scholars, engineers—people interested in knowledge—we come at the
questions a little bit differently. So we think we can be innovative and
breathe some fresh air into a conversation that often is about how many
jobs are going to be cut, or what will happen to all the space that is
freed up once the stacks move out” says Schnapp.

In the first two books of this seminal series that deals with how comics reflect the culture they emanate from, Federick Stromberg dealt with the representation of Blacks and the Devil.

For volume three he turns to the Semites. Spanning five centuries and featuring over 150 images the book becomes an instant essential reference. Chapters include Anti-Semitism, the Old Testament,
the Holocaust, Israel, the Golem and the artists range from A-list types like Will Eisner and Art Spiegelman to the more obscure. Every image gets an essay and there is an extensive bibliography.

It was at BEA 5 years ago that Margret Atwood and company unleashed the LongPen in America. It was hailed as “the world’s first real time, pen and ink long-distance autographing device” which produces “legally valid” signatures.

It was to be the 21st century version of the autopen. It was to revolutionize and revitalize the author reading experience which by then was a much less common event in bookstores around the country.

“I can’t wait to see how this one plays out” was how I ended my post on the initial American release of the LongPen in June of 2007, How Far Will the LongPen Reach?

Well, here we are in 2012 and it safe to say that though they have had some success in other areas, the LongPen’s reach has been pretty limited in the literary world.

Earlier in the year LongPen morphed into iDoLVine. Now we have the next permutation, Fanado “an online event space where artists and performers can connect with fans and aficionados, present to audiences, greet fans one-on-one, sign personalized collectibles, sell directly online, live stream and archive the event, and create personal experiences and lasting memories.”

Fanado has recently launched a Indiegogo campaign to fund a couple of mobile apps to help fulfill Fanado’s mission of “Anyone, Anytime, Anyplace.”

Will the third time be the charm for the technology? Was the LongPen on the bleeding edge of innovation when it surfaced in 2006? Has the acceptance of the technology caught up and now it sits on the cutting edge? Or is it the fact that the experience of attending a reading and having a book signed will simply not transfer to the virtual world.

A clue might be that after 6 years of the technology the backers are now turning to crowdsourcing to stay alive.

Books play a major role in the work of Rick Beerhorst. In this the first of a two-part post on his book work, we focus on his paintings of girls in the act of reading. His work is steeped in the folk art, pop-surrealism style with a hint of Magritte

SPAM poetry is a series of knitted works containing visual poetry created from SPAM. It is a collaboration between Varvara Guljajeva and Mar Canet Sola who are “interested in bringing together digital culture and traditional handicraft.” It was undertaken as an artist-in-residency project at MU in Eindhoven.

Note: This is a seattlepi.com reader blog. It is not written or edited by the P-I. The authors are solely responsible for content. E-mail us at newmedia@seattlepi.com if you consider a post inappropriate.